Trip Reports - First trip report..LHR-HKG-LHR in First

Here goes...Saturday 18thNov.
Boarded just about last ,10mins before STD and settled into 1K. I am a bit of a people watcher so normally prefer a seat a little less isolated..but hey, whos complaining.
After settling in, was greeted by the Cabin crew and offered a drink-champagne seemed the way to go so tucked into a lovely glass of Heidsieck Blanc de Millenaires. Along with the warm Macadamias it disappeared rather quickly but was topped up just as quickly by the very attentive crew. Menus etc handed round and after take off was offered another drink. Having perused the wine list I decided on a rather nice Beaune du chateau premier cru2004 Domaine Bouchard Pere et fils. Very tasty and topped up regularly, along with a little plate of appetizers. Table was set for dinner afte crew had taken my order. Choices for starters were Mark Edwards' foie gras and duck confit with plum wine jelly and broiche croutons,grilled asparagus with black truffle butter, roast onion soup with yarg cheese croutons or salad leaves with red pepper or garlic and tarragon dressing. I plumped for the duck and foie gras and I have to say, I enjoyed it immensly....I could have eaten another ! After a short while my starter was removed and due to my main course being beef I switched to a red wine...a rather lovely Chateau Leoville-Poyferre 1995 grand cru classe St Julien. Main course arrived promptly along with a basket of warmed rolls and I settled down to enjoy a Beef fillet with Cep reduction, Anna potatoes and green beans. Quite good, but a hard act to follow after the Duck ! Other options were fresh catch of the day, a stir fried chicken dish or poached salmon. Dessert of Rhubarb tart or Chocolate espresso delice with Mascarpone and raspberries (my choice) followed promptly, along with an offer of a glass of Sauternes which I declined. Not a fan of sweet wines. Crew tried to tempt me with Port, or other after dinner drinks, but I settled for a mug of Earl grey tea and some choccies from the big box of Green and Blacks.
Time to make my bed....the crew did offer to do it but I can manage thanks. Nice white cotton mattress topper and duvet provided-shame the cabin temp was so warm that the duvet was unnecessary. Started to watch a movie but dozed off and woke in time for full english brekky about 8 hours later !
Excellent flight all in all....forgot to mention mine and 2K seat reading lights failed early on, but 2K pax mentioned to Captain when he appeared in cabin...a bit of electrical-trickery later and bingo....then there was light !!

Neglected to say will post about return flight after I've done the school run, and I did want to take photos onboard but felt a bit silly taking pictures of my food....has anyone else felt like that ??? Crew looked at me a bit strangely so I only took two !

Thanks for the report. I am guessing from the menu that the carrier was BA? ;)

I did feel silly taking photo's of food but I still did it anyway as I know it is always appreciated here at FT TR land. I was always very discrete and careful as to when I clicked. I was 'caught' a few times by the crew in F, but that is probably because they come round more often :)

There was a thread recently on the BA forum where some of the crew stated that they were amused (but in a nice way) to see people taking photos of their food.

Almost forgot Welcome to FlyerTalk no longer atc :D

Thanks to Moomba for spotting my not so deliberate mistake...yes it was on BA !
Tuesday 21st November. BA26 HKG-LHR F cabin seat 5E.
Was offered the familiar 1K again but plumped for 5E and sat next to a charming gent who was most chatty. Very pleasant companion. CSD was flapping a little as the torrential rain at HKG had managed to soak carpets near the doors and wanted them drying before we left. Not a problem as a pax was being offloaded due to excess alcohol so his bags had to be found and offloaded too. Whilst boarding a huge thunderstorm was raging outside , unsettling the nervous flyer in 3A-crew spent a little time reassuring her and all OK. Started with the usual Heidsieck fizz and nuts, whilst examining the dinner menu.........opted for the King prawn and pink grapefruit salad, followed by Shaun Hills' roast veal fillet with lemon,garlic and parsley, lyonnaise potatoes and roasted veg. Very tasty too and beautifully presented. I was a little surprised my choices were all available, as the crew informed me the flight had only 3 pax booked, but cabin ended up full due to pax from later flts turning up early and opting for an earlier departure. I again drank a little too much of the lovely Beaune,followed by a Barossa valley Shiraz- I was disappointed to see my preferred choice of the St Julien unavailable-however the Aussie red was fine. Dessert was a Seville orange and almond tart with vanilla ice cream-not really up to BA's usual dessert standard, but OK. Tea and chocs again followed, and so to bed. Again cabin baking hot, and lady in 4E discovered her seat would not recline. Cabin crew came and had a fiddle around in the electrics and managed to get it going. Well done girls..around this time there was a huge lightening flash and a rumble throughout the airframe. Captain later told us we had been struck by lightening but no damage done. Rest of flt uneventful, slept OK, didn't bother with cooked breakfast , just juice and croissants. On stand at LHR around 10mins early, and home by 0645....your comments appreciated on my first trip report...won't be up to the lofty standards of Kiwi and Moomba....

I did want to take photos onboard but felt a bit silly taking pictures of my food....has anyone else felt like that ??? Crew looked at me a bit strangely so I only took two !

When people ask, I always tell them I have a friend who's a Flight Attendant at a US airline and she wanted to see what a proper First Class meal service looked like. Everyone knows, including other airline employees, that meal service aboard US carriers is embarrassingly poor when compared to the best European or Asian airlines. This approach more than rationalizes taking the pictures and most of the F/As seem proud to show off their product to the "competition".

Besides, who cares what anyone thinks of an activity as innocuous as taking pictures of the cabin or your meal? You'll likely never see eachother ever again anyway. :D

The one US airline that has I think a superior Business Class meal service to most any European or Asian airline is Continental. Check out one of their menus (http://www.continental.com/web/en-US/content/travel/inflight/businessfirst/menu/gruiah.aspx?menuMonth=200612).

As to your trip report, you've managed to describe an entire 12+ hour First Class flight experience - from check-in to landing - aboard a world class airline in just 452 words. That may be a new record here at FT! I doubt I could have done it in less than 7,000, so perhaps I could learn something from your reporting style. ;)

Thanks for your trip report!! A very nice way of entering the FT community! :)

and I did want to take photos onboard but felt a bit silly taking pictures of my food....has anyone else felt like that ??? Crew looked at me a bit strangely so I only took two !
It's embarassing taking photos onboard, but you just have to think "I don't care what other people think".
I have an ongoing trip report as you may have seen, and I basically have a photo of every single dish I had during all 34 flights. I thought it was too big of an experience to fly F round the world to waste photo opportunities because of embarassment.
You just have to learn to be discreet, take photos when the FAs are serving other passengers or seconds after they have served you (when they are likely to go back to the galley), and don't use flash!!
Sooner or later you will be "caught", but nobody ever said anything to me, and if you're using a digital camera you can always pretend you're just playing with it.

Alarmed to hear that BA seem to have reverted to sauna-like cabin temperatures; I have largely switched to VS UC transatlantic as a result, but had a couple of reasonable BA flights in J LAX-LHR earlier in the year with resaonable cabin temperature. From your experienced it seems like it may be luck of the draw, so I'll be sticking with VS when I can for now.

When people ask, I always tell them I have a friend who's a Flight Attendant at a US airline and she wanted to see what a proper First Class meal service looked like.

Perfect answer! I've always wondered about that too. I feel a bit awkward taking pictures of my food :D I'll use this trick from now on. Thanks Seat 2A!